SXSW 2017 Film Retrospective | Hard Knocks and Horrors

Action thrillers and horror comedies were some of the best movies SXSW 2017 had to offer.

Film festivals are a glorious place to be a cinephile, a place where like-minded individuals wait in line all day to watch as many new films as possible, films that could very well change the face of the art form as we know it. SXSW 2017 was no exception. I attended this year’s festival and crammed as many screenings as I possibly could into a few short days, for fear of missing sometimes amazing. Fortunately, my efforts mostly paid off. I saw some extraordinary motion pictures at this year’s SXSW, most of them thrillers and horror movies, with only a handful of disappointments.

Of course, there is never enough time to see everything at a film festival. This is the tragedy of attending events like SXSW, where a decision to see one filmcan easily – through the complications of geography and scheduling – prevent you from seeing other several others. So although we were at SXSW 2017 and covering as many motion pictures as we possibly could there were a handful of prominent, hot ticket films that we weren’t able to see, like The Disaster Artist (about the making of one of the worst films ever made, Tommy Wiseau’s The Room) and the critically acclaimed comedy Mr. Roosevelt, written and starring and directed by Saturday Night Live alumnus Noël Wells.

Let’s take a look at the eleven films (and one tv show) I was able to watch over the course of the first weekend at SXSW 2017, many of which are destined to eventually arrive at a theater near you, and most of which are worth seeking out for yourself as soon as possible.